On the drive home I was idly thinking about what changes I'd make, if I could, to our system of governance after this administration is - ideally - gone. I suppose in no particular order, here is a list of what I'd do, sorted by the mechanism for doing it.

First, the only amendment: An amendment declaring that the president cannot pardon himself or any officer, member of employee of the executive branch, current or former. It would also specify any existing pardons of executive branch members are void.

Amendments are hard, but this is the obvious thing which can only be fixed with an amendment and it obviously needs to get done. The upside of an amendment is that the amendment process is the only way to get around constitutional stipulations against bills of attainder and ex post facto laws.

Then the legislative changes: 1) Create a permanent legislative agency, overseen by congress, composed of a standing prosecutorial team whose sole purpose is to investigate and charge members of the executive branch (current and former) for lawbreaking in their duties.

2) Repeal Qualified Immunity. 3) A law stipulating that a president or defense secretary making war (or other hostilities) without the authorization of congress, beyond the scope of the war powers resolution is a felony, with no statute of limitations, punishable by up to life imprisonment.

Then the organizational changes (also requiring Congress): 1) Dismantle DHS. ICE and CBP are decommissioned, their duties taken over be a reborn Immigration and Naturalization Services. INS goes back to Justice, Customs goes back to Treasury, and so on. Reset to 2002, in effect. DHS sucks.